European leaders failed to reach an agreement on the bloc’s Multiannual Financial Framework for 2021-2027, after more than 24 hours of negotiations and dozens of bilateral meetings held during EU’s emergency summit.
Heads of State or government did not manage to bridge their differences, with the big net contributors unwilling to negotiate their budget proposal equal to 1% of EU’s Gross National Income (GNI) and pushing for more cuts to cohesion policy and agriculture, to keep the total cost down.
“It was impossible to reach an agreement”, said EU Council’s President, Charles Michel, adding that “more time” is needed to reconcile different opinions.
Less funds, more priorities
Michel presented on Friday a last-minute European Commission plan, which offered 1.07% of EU’s GNI and would trim €10 billion off his official proposal. As the Commission’s technical proposal did not satisfy major requirements by the majority of member states and included fresh cuts that would strike the Horizon Europe program, EU’s defence plan and space program, several countries labelled the proposal as “insufficient”.
The “frugals”, namely Netherlands, Austria, Sweden and Denmark, plus Germany, that refused to pay more to cover the €60-75 billion Brexit hole, would retain their rebates under the new proposal, while France would see extra cash to subsidise its farmers.
However, as more sectors were added to EU’s long-term priorities, several states stressed that they cannot do more with less funds. Fighting against climate change, promoting the digital agenda and developing EU’s defence and security sector, requires the mobilisation of vast funds, however not all countries agreed on the same prioritisation of funding.
The “Friends of Cohesion,” who were renamed to “Friends of an ambitious Europe” tasked Italy with preparing a counter-proposal along with Portugal and Romania, that would reflect a more ambitious plan of funding to support their flagship policies of agriculture and cohesion.
EU Executive body’s chief, Ursula von der Leyen said that there is a “long way ahead” until a deal is reached, as the European Parliament must give its endorsement. She also highlighted that in case no deal is reached this year, the bloc would lack funds for borders control, regional development, research and Erasmus.
“This is democracy. We have 27 different members states, with 27 different interests,” EU’s chief said, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel also citing that “the differences were simply too big.”
As EU leaders failed to reach a compromise on the bloc’s €1.09 trillion spending package, Michel concluded that “as my grandmother used to say, to succeed you have at least to try”.
Emergency EU summit called off with no budget deal
EPA-EFE/LUDOVIC MARIN / POOL
A worker vaccums the red carpet ahead of leaders arrivals ahead of the second day of a Special European Council summit in Brussels, Belgium, 21 February 2020.
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